


Recombination and other basics of cell biology

by JaqofSpades



Category: Veronica Mars (Movie 2014), Veronica Mars (TV), Veronica Mars - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-17
Updated: 2015-01-17
Packaged: 2018-03-07 21:17:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3183491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaqofSpades/pseuds/JaqofSpades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wallace is prepping for his 9th grade biology class.  But mostly thinking about Mac.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Recombination and other basics of cell biology

**Author's Note:**

  * For [helsinkibaby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/gifts).



> Helsinki Baby wanted something Mac and Wallace. And I've been wanting to write their movie dynamic for a while now. So this happened :D

Wallace was fiddling with the stereo in his car when he heard her heels trip-trapping down the steps of her new condo. He hadn't really looked up – she was the one that demanded good music after all – so he didn't have even the slightest warning, just the warm whoosh of night air as she opened the door and sunk into the seat next to him, and the sudden press of soft lips on his cheek.

He'd thrown her a distracted grin, then looked again, longer. She was stretching out, wriggling her butt against the leather, all strong brown legs and fierce hair and cleavage and _Mac_ , but … he felt his breath catch. He hadn't been able to stop his eyes drifting down, and by the time they made it all the way back up to her face, the blood was pounding in his ears. And further south, too, making him shift in his seat as his brain struggled to catch up.

They weren't that way, it had yelled at him. Never had been, despite having logged thousands of hours in each other's company. They'd cleaved together after Veronica had left, mitochondria and cytoplasm left inert after their nucleus had bailed, but over time, something like their own little cell had shuddered into being. But, not this. Friends.

(So he's teaching cell biology this semester and the metaphors won't leave him alone. Recombination, he thinks as he stares at the reading he's setting for tonight. The process or act of exchanges of genes between chromosomes resulting in a different genetic combination. He wants to ...)

Friends, he'd kept telling himself, pretending he wasn't watching her ass bunch and jiggle every time she moved, or the way disdain would frost her blue eyes into shards of shimmering glass. Their colour would change again when she'd turn back to him and Veronica and giggle, safe inside their own bubble. So familiar, so them, but it had never made him ache before.

Never made him want to bundle her into a corner and lick his way into that wisecracking mouth and find all the sweetness that she kept just for them. Because that was the weirdest thing. It wasn't just him noticing her tight dress and even tighter body, he'd always known that. It was Mac, owning those things. Triumphant.

And she's _killing_ him.

If she'd noticed him being weird, she hadn't said anything. They'd danced that night, before things had gotten crazy, and then again at the after party. He'd left his car at Veronica's, so they'd shared a cab, him sandwiched between Mac and Veronica, Piz turning round from the front seat to throw drunken remarks their way as he sat there, telling himself he was being stupid. Creepy, even, as he spread his legs a little just to feel the warmth of her along the full length of his thigh.

She'd swung around, all high-octane energy and mile-wide smile, and thrown her arm around him to pull him into the argument with Veronica. He wanted to tell her she's wasting her breath – Veronica will do what she always does when Logan Echolls is involved – but his entire focus was trained on desperately willing away the erection threatening to make itself known in his pants. Move away, he told himself, but that's when she dropped her head into his neck to whisper “help!” into his ear.

He's never wanted to kiss anyone more in his life, he'd thought, and please God let it be some sort of temporary madness that'll pass quickly before he embarrasses himself. Luckily, they pulled up at Veronica's house, and all piled out, and he was able to make his excuses before his alcohol-impaired brain decided to just do it. Plant one on her. Preferably with tongue and his hands _everywhere_.

Three weeks later, he's still thinking about her as he polishes his lesson plan in his spare before class, every word and every sentence and every last scientific theory somehow leading him back to his dilemma.

He wants to start something with Mac, but he's known her for so long, even approaching the topic will be awkward. He doesn't even know whether she's still dating men these days – there's been more girls than guys over the years, and he hates himself for actually caring about that now. Not like it matters who she's dating when he's probably in a category of his own, so beyond consideration that it's completely irrelevant, he reminds himself.

And then he remembers that warm puff of breath on his neck, and the strange little moment when they'd danced together. They'd been hamming it up, three quarters past ridiculous, when she'd shimmied herself right around and backed into him, that glorious butt dipping and swaying right in front of him, so sexy his eyes had practically crossed. His hands had found their way to her hips and he'd almost pulled her right back onto him, blind with it, but then Veronica had danced up and the moment broke. 

He'd puffed out his frustration in a single long breath, and he hadn't realised Mac was watching him until he looked up again. She can't have seen him blush – it was dark in there and he's a black man and no one could have seen it, okay? - but one sharply-defined brow hitched upwards anyway, and then her mouth had curved into a self-satisfied little smirk that – well. It made him wonder. Still does. It probably didn't mean anything. But if it did – the breath hisses out of him, freshly poleaxed. It's enough hope to hang himself with.

(Protein synthesis consists of two processes: transcription and translation. During transcription, a strand of mRNA is made that is complementary to a strand of DNA. During translation, the genetic code in mRNA is read to make a protein.)

Hope's well and good, but what the hell does he do now? Ask her out on a date? Invite her over for beer and pizza and just make a move? Change his afternoon run to a morning run just so he can watch her do her workout on Dog Beach, getting off on the way the beads of sweat gather at the nape of her neck, along her collarbone, in that dizzying landscape at the base of her spine?

He feels almost dirty thinking of her this way, not knowing whether or not it's actually reciprocated. Could it be? Have there been signs he's missed, or refused to see? If he hasn't felt this before, what's to say it won't just fade away?

He doesn't want it to fade away, Wallace finally admits to himself. And looking back … maybe there's always been more there than he wanted to admit. (Last time he'd done a workout with Mac was nearly a year ago. And he'd obviously been watching her more closely than he realised if he remembers where the sweat pools on her body.)

He knows every hair colour she's ever tried. He knows the smell of her shampoo, and the sound of her steps behind him in the hall. “You always smell good,” he'd told her once, and she'd made some joke about him looking for snickerdoodles, but, but … it's not the first time he's wanted to stand beside her and breathe her in.

Just the first time he's wanted to drown in it. And taste it. Taste her.

And just like that he's hard again, and he can't be because this damn classroom is going to be full of kids in less than 10 minutes and he's gonna have to be able to talk about the cell cycle and mitosis and meiosis without his brain resetting to its current default of Mac, Mac, Mac. He hasn't seen her since the reunion, and he's having to face facts: he's gotta find out whether it was just the dress or the sexy hair or the us-against-the-world vibe that had sprung up between them since they'd found out exactly why Veronica was back in town.

Maybe it's some weird side effect of the pheromones that Dumb and Dumber had been spitting out since the minute they'd laid eyes on each other again. His heart freaking hurts for Piz, but Veronica and Logan, man. Their thing had never really finished, and he'd told Piznarski that, over and over, but the dude hadn't wanted to listen. Veronica hadn't wanted to listen, and she's the master of fooling everybody including herself, so he can't hold it against Piz.

And he can relate, all of sudden. Because this thing, it's making him wonder. Has he been fooling himself? Were all the other girls – including the one he was engaged to for a while there – just time fillers as he waited for something to happen with Mac?

He can't believe that, he won't, but why now? What's changed? He'd spent all night with her on the couch just a month ago, legs tangled together under a blanket while they watched all the Fast and Furious movies back to back and now, and now …

His cock twitches again as his memory reruns that night, and all the things they could have done on that couch. Off that couch, on his knees between her legs, pulling off those ratty boyfriend jeans she likes to wear, face between her thighs …

(Selective permeability: a process in which a cell membrane allows some molecules to pass through while keeping others out.)

Fuck it. Things change. Boundaries shift. Maybe Mac-and-Wallace has been there all along, just waiting for the right time to come in, he tells himself, heart suddenly thudding in anticipation. He's got five minutes before class starts, and maybe if he does this now, he'll actually be able to concentrate on cell biology. 

He pulls out his phone, and doesn't fail to notice she's first in his list of favourites, and has been for a while. He should text her, because she rarely answers at work, but he wants to say the words aloud. It feels braver. He leaves a message, and wonders if she'll hear it in his voice.

“MacAttack. Movie night tomorrow. You bought me that stack of crappy dance movies, remember?”

He takes a deep breath, and prepares to plunge through the barrier.

“Wear that sexy black dress again and we might even end up dancing.”  
 _  
fin_

_Disclaimer: This is a transformative work (fan fiction) as protected under the fair use provisions of international copyright law. I am not profiting from this work, nor do I make any claims to, or intend any infringement on, the intellectual properties held by the rights owner._


End file.
